City special school is taken out of monitoring

A CARDIFF school is no longer being monitored by the education watchdog after making “significant” improvements in the last two years.

Riverbank Special School in Caerau is being removed from monitoring by Estyn, the education inspectorate for Wales.

A previous inspection found the school did not have a full range of policies and procedures to support the wellbeing of pupils.

Welcoming the Estyn decision, deputy council leader and cabinet member for education, employment and skills, Councillor Sarah Merry, said: “I want to congratulate everyone at Riverbank Special School on this excellent news.

“I am delighted that Estyn has recognised the enormous amount of work undertaken by the school, with the support of the local authority, to drive up standards.”

Since the inspectorate took the decision to put Riverbank into monitoring, Cardiff council worked with the school to strengthen governance and to facilitate partnership working with neighbouring special schools Woodlands and Ty Gwyn.

The success of the joint working led to the schools drawing up plans earlier this year to create formal ties.

This resulted in the decision being taken for all three to become the Western Learning Campus from January 8.

Acting head teacher of Riverbank Special School Deborah Herald said: “I am delighted that the hard work and dedication of the Riverbank staff has been recognised in this way.

“The school has gone on a tremendous journey since the original inspection in 2015 and we have done it together as a whole school.”

Estyn inspectors also found that important changes had been made in terms of strengthening safeguarding.

They added “very good” progress had been made in ensuring policies and statutory guidance were reviewed regularly and kept up-to-date.

They found changes are beginning to have a positive impact on practice, including the school’s approach to managing pupils’ behaviour.

At the time of the critical report, published in January 2016 after the inspection in November 2015, lead inspector Anthony Mulcahy said it was not appropriate to compare the standards of achievement at the school with national averages because of the wide range of pupils’ special educational needs.